Friday, November 27, 2009

My DTM (Design Theory and Methods) class is working on creating game boards. Our group chose the Doomsday clock as our event in history. My section of the project right now is to create the card design and characters/people cards. Here are the dictators that we have chosen to be the pieces. I will post more later as the project develops. We have a full working plexi-glass gear system the makes the clock rotate as you turn it with the 'dictator' cards.

Wednesday, November 25, 2009

Driving a Car with an iPhone!"we turned an Oldsmobile Delta '88 into a remote control car in just 4 weeks. We built our control systems using a few motors, potentiometers, a Compact RIO embedded controller, and LabVIEW. We then set up wi-fi communication so we can drive the car from an iPhone as well as from a modified Power Wheels truck."

Tuesday, November 24, 2009

Last week we got the chance to go to 'Bodies: The Exhibition' at the mall of America. It was fantastic and I would definitely recommend others to go. I actually figured out a few corrections I could make to my muscle mannequin from looking at the actual muscles rather than those pictured in a book. We were not allowed to bring out cameras in so the only picture I really have is my 30 minute drawing I did. The models were great but since each one was focusing on certain part there were a few chunks missing so don't mind the random anorexic arm.

Quite literally, but not because our work was fantastic by any means. The gallery was empty so we all pinned up our shell drawings. After looking at my shell drawing on the wall I saw a few more things wrong but also found some fantastic items as well.

First off, the drawings all look better from 10 feet away rather than sniffing the conte-crayon dust off of the paper. Some of the contour lines I was not sure of actually looked alright once I stepped back from the piece. I also found some parts that could possibly be more defined or cleaned up slightly. As I commented in my previous post...I used a new medium as well as did not worry about super clean lines and it shows.

We also had group critiques. My group suggested that I should work on line weight (why I originally used the conte-crayon) but still push it more. Part of the reason for my lack of line weight was that I had not sharpened my tool I used a dull crayon to loosen up my lines. They also suggested to chose a view with a little more foreshortening as well. Overall they said I did a good job but to work with those for the next drawing.

side note:I spent a good 6-7 hours on my drawing but it seems many students spent much less time. As a student and one that loves to expand my knowledge and skill I find it frustrating to see other students with a lack of work ethic. If your drawing is going in the wrong direction, restart or fix what is wrong rather than just settling for less. The shell drawings may not be the most stimulating thing I have ever done but I find the shapes very intriguing and a good way to work on modeling.

This post will soon make more sense once I post the actual drawing I am talking about. We were to purchase a 38 x 50 or so sheet of heavy paper and draw a cross-contour of a shell. That cannot be too hard you think to yourself.Well first of all it was! Two reasons...the scale of the piece (mine are usually done on 8.5 x 11 sheets of paper) and problem number two is my shell. The shell has some sort of freaky legs growing out of it. Question: since when do shells grow appendages? NEVER! (at least that is what I originally thought). This drawing was a little bit of a struggle to say the least.One thing they mentioned at mid-program review was to work on loosening up and freeing up my lines. That is exactly what I did and not sure how great it worked out. When I draw I want everything to be clean and stripped to the essentials without extra clutter. I had to go back and fix many of my lines because they were incorrect for the simple fact of how I held the conte-crayon.

note to self: conte-crayons and un-controlled lines are evil

Well in the end I think I learned more from getting a little bit frustrated than I have in a while. Sometimes I need to try new things and get over everything being clean up and perfect. If I were to spend time on making all of my lines clean I would have died before I finished.

Thursday, November 19, 2009

This is officially the first successful skull I have ever drawn...granted it is only my third try ever I guess that just isn't too bad. I am excited to get working with the face. Once I understand the skull better I will try to work it into my sketches and faces. Knowing more of the structure underneath the skin will help me further define the jaw and other features. Another concept I may work with is adding a skeleton under the face and possibly some cross-contour lines.

Wednesday, November 18, 2009

This recent project was a sign for a laptop station that had hook-ups for a monitor, keyboard, and mouse. Students around the library were wanting to hook up their laptop the a second monitor and were disconnecting the desktop pc's. Hopefully this solution will work out nicely.

Monday, November 16, 2009

Well I was sitting in math class once again just sketching along and this is what I came up with. I think it is a fun character. Everyday I am trying to work on developing and tuning my illustration style.

Friday, November 6, 2009

I am finally getting back to updating my personal site solliedesign.com. I have been very busy lately and not had any extra time. There is still much to work on and more to update but hopefully sometime in the near future I will try to update my portfolio every few weeks.

Thursday, November 5, 2009

'P.O.S. Is Ruining My Life' must be my favorite song by...you guess it, P.O.S. but this one is definitely worth a listen. I never thought that a hip-hop album would have a beat based off cup stacking but here it is. There is also a great indy feel to the video and the stop photography. One of Minneapolis' own and finally a rapper with skills as well.